Sermon – Malachi 3:1-20 - Refiner's Fire

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard

Pitts Creek and Beaver Dam Churches

Sermon – Malachi 3:1-20 - Refiner's Fire

Advent 2

December 9, 2012

Last week we saw that Christmas brings us hope. We usually fear the future and often fall into despair when we realize that what we fear the most can't be change. When this happens we need someone to save us. And at Christmas we remember God's promise to send Jesus Christ as that savior. Today we will look closely at what will happens when that savior arrives, and you may or may not like what the savior does. We will get to this, but first let's pray.

“Grant unto us, O Lord, to be occupied in the mysteries of thy heavenly wisdom, with true progress in piety, to thy glory and our own edification. Amen.” (John Calvin)

The prophet Malachi lived four to five hundred years before Jesus. Jerusalem was a province of Persia and had limited freedom provided that taxes were paid. The city and temple had been rebuilt after having been destroyed by the Babylonians. Worship had returned to the temple with the celebration of feasts and animal sacrifices. And people had begun gathering in local communities to study the word of God in what was called synagogues. Everything seemed to be going on smoothly with one big exception. The glory of God was not present in the temple.

When Solomon built the first temple it was the place where God could reside on earth. God's glory was seen in the Holy of Holies. But when the Babylonians destroyed the temple God ascended to heaven. And so far his glory remain absent. This was the problem Malachi was looking into. Why was God's glory missing?

As Malachi thought about this and looked into what was going on he began to see the problem. The people were engaging in worship, prayer and Bible study, but they were not living the way God had commanded them to live. Here is how God described the situation speaking through the mouth of the prophet.

Malachi 3:5 ⁵ "So I will come near to you for judgment. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive aliens of justice, but do not fear me," says the LORD Almighty.

So the people of Judah were hypocrites. They engaged in the form of worship, they pretended to believe, but though their works they demonstrated their unfaithfulness. People were into witchcraft and spells. They cheated on their spouses. They lied in court. They didn't pay fair wages. They didn't care for the poorest in their communities. They denied justice to the immigrants. All of this is bad enough, but it goes even further.

Malachi 3:8-11 ⁸ "Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me. "But you ask, 'How do we rob you?' "In tithes and offerings. ⁹ You are under a curse-- the whole nation of you-- because you are robbing me. ¹⁰ Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. ¹¹ I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit," says the LORD Almighty.

The people of Judah were not bringing their tithe, 10% of their income, to the temple. This was robbing God! No wonder God hadn't returned. Why would he to such an unfaithful people? This should be a warning to us. Christmas is not automatic. The savior we hope for only comes to the faithful. And if our faithlessness is apparent in the way we live our lives why would we expect a savior to come to us? And if a savior did come and we were living sinful lives like that what would he do? He would judge us. So if you are hoping for a savior to come this Christmas be careful what you wish for because you might just get it.

Malachi realized that one day God would enter into the temple and his glory would return. This would be the day of the Lord. On that day all the sinners of Judah would stand before the Lord, trembling, because of their failure to obey God's law.

But then Malachi realized something very important about God. God is like a silversmith. Let me explain. Normally silver is found in nature filled with impurities. Silver in this state is not particularly shiny and would not make a good mirror. But if you refine the silver by heating it over a fire it will bubble and hiss as the impurity, oxygen, escapes leaving behind pure silver. If you then add carbon, charcoal, to the molten silver the oxygen cannot return, and you are left with a shiny metal that can be polished into a mirror that reflects your image.

So too with us. We were created to reflect the image of God. We were pure and polished and reflected God's glory perfectly until sin entered the world. Sin is a impurity that distorts God's image in us. We can't get rid of sin any more than silver can get rid of oxygen by itself. Like silver we need a refiner who will purge the impurity of sin from us so that we again reflect God's image perfectly. Malachi said that this refiner is God, and God will purge the impurity of sin from us. Malachi described it in this way.

Malachi 3:1-4 ^NIV Malachi 3:1 "See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come," says the LORD Almighty. ² But who can endure the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears? For he will be like a refiner's fire or a launderer's soap. ³ He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; he will purify the Levites and refine them like gold and silver. Then the LORD will have men who will bring offerings in righteousness, ⁴ and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the LORD, as in days gone by, as in former years.

So according to Malachi God will begin refining us with fire, purging the impurity of sin from us when he enter the temple. When will this happen? When will God return to the temple? Hundreds of years after Malachi, God did return to his temple. The witness was named Simeon. Here is what happened.

Luke 2:22-32 ²² When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord ²³ (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, "Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord"), ²⁴ and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: "a pair of doves or two young pigeons." ²⁵ Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. ²⁶ It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Christ. ²⁷ Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, ²⁸ Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying: ²⁹ "Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. ³⁰ For my eyes have seen your salvation, ³¹ which you have prepared in the sight of all people, ³² a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel."

So the glory of God returned to the temple when Jesus was brought there by his parents in obedience to God law. And at that moment our refinement began. God has already started the process for sin to be purged away from us. Jesus is the one who came to remove sin from our lives. And this is really good news because we don't have to remove sin ourselves. It wouldn't do any good for me to wave my finger at you and tell you not to sin. You would simply ignore me and keep doing what you are doing. But if the glory of God is present here in this church your transformation has already begun. You are already experiencing a distaste of sin. You are already less likely to be unfaithful to your spouse. You are already caring for the poor and foreigners. You are already giving to the church. These are all signs that the glory of God is on you, the Spirit of God is in you, refining you, and purging your sin away.

This transformation in you is called sanctification and is the work of the Holy Spirit. Sanctification is a lifelong process that refines you so that you reflect the glory of God as you were created to do. Sanctification can be nurtured by the church in worship, prayer and Bible study. So I urge you to come to worship every Sunday, study the Bible in a small group every week and pray every day. Do this and you will become more and more like Christ.

Holy Spirit I ask that you enter into my church and hearts of these people and transform them into the image and likeness of Christ. Purge from them the sin that has stained them since birth. Empower our worship, prayers and Bible studies to promote spiritual growth. And provide us evidence of that growth in the increased faithfulness of couples, an expanding concern for the poor and immigrants, and tithing to the church. This we pray in the name of the one who brought God's glory into the temple, Jesus Christ. Amen.